


A Special Kind of Devotion

by sharehenstar



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Both Platonic and Otherwise, Episode Tag, Episode: s04e01-02 The Darkest Hour, Episode: s04e03 The Wicked Day, Episode: s04e12-13 The Sword in the Stone, Fluff and Angst, Kissing, M/M, There May Be Others, Two Idiots Who REALLY Can't Admit Their Feelings, Until They Actually Do
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 17:32:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5674588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharehenstar/pseuds/sharehenstar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No men can tear down each other’s self-erected barriers quite like Merlin and Arthur can…</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Special Kind of Devotion

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, everyone! This particular fic of mine is sweet, fluffy, angsty outlet for those scenes I see playing out in my head in a somewhat different manner than they are portrayed in the actual series. As you’ll see below, The Darkest Hour (Part 2) and The Wicked Day were the first to receive the “flangst” treatment. For any of you—especially in The Darkest Hour—who found it almost painful how fraught several particularly heavy silences between our two boys were with unspoken words, emotions, and actions, this might just be for you. I know I certainly felt like knocking their two heads together on multiple occasions! Please enjoy!

(1)

Over five years of service to the man, and by now, Merlin knew Arthur well enough to know that the King Regent had never properly learned how to express his emotions.  And while the warlock might tease the older boy about his emotional constipation, he nonetheless acknowledged that Arthur felt things far more deeply than he might otherwise display to those around him.

It had flattered Merlin to know that he was one of the very few who could elicit those emotions from his friend (despite Arthur typically making them known as frustration and annoyance).

Even aware as he was of that, however, it did nothing to prepare him for Arthur’s reaction when Merlin became enthralled by the Dorocha:

_Arthur spent most of the night sitting up with Merlin, who had been swathed from head to toe in as many blankets, cloaks, and capes (including Arthur’s own) as could be found, trying to ward off Death’s edge for a few hours more._

_Once it became apparent most of the Knights had drifted off, the King Regent shifted Merlin so that he cradled his manservant’s still-violently trembling form in his lap.  They spoke not one word to each other, Merlin’s lips too numb and clumsy to form the words he **knew** he had to say, lest Camelot lose her beloved young monarch.  Arthur had seemed just as overwhelmed, and from his repeated swallowing, Merlin hazily deduced that perhaps he simply could not find the words at all._

_Only when dawn started to break, and the Knights started to stir, did Arthur seem to crack.  Quite literally, in fact, when a particularly ferocious tremor of Merlin’s sent the King Regent lurching forward to bury his head in the back of Merlin’s neck._

_As Arthur’s shaking lips accidentally collided with Merlin’s skin, and Merlin found himself too far gone to process the words he felt them start to form there, the warlock released one, tremulous sigh, and opened his mouth to begin his argument with Arthur anew._

With health and hindsight came the realization that, messy and faint as it had been, Arthur had, in fact, kissed him.  In a manner of speaking.

Merlin, however, could not convince himself that it had been anything more than an ill imagining of his overwrought mind and quietly resigned himself to that fact.

Until it happened again, still more of an accident than an actual intent.

Innocuous at best, _this_ kiss had grazed his right temple, just as Arthur slung his arm around Merlin’s neck, pulling his head into a fierce clasp as they made their way back to the jubilant knights and the Dorocha-warding fire.

Merlin had found himself almost too overwhelmed by the Knights’ clear exuberance (and Arthur’s limb-trembling relief) at his hale and hearty self’s return to notice it at first.  However, such unprecedented warmth pressing into his skin was a little difficult to ignore.

Whipping his head around to confirm it only resulted in an impromptu burying of Merlin’s face against Arthur’s neck, and the young King Regent’s shaky exhale into his hair.

IOIOIOIOIOI 

(2)

Once could certainly qualify as an accident.  A second time, rather unlikely to prove anything _but_ an accident.

Merlin never expected it to happen a third time.  Even less, that _he_ would reciprocate or address it, honestly believing the action to be something of an oddity.

What Merlin should have remembered about Arthur, however (although the man remained unaware of it), was that no other had a greater ability to surpass Merlin’s self-erected barriers than he.

The first time Merlin kissed Arthur (somewhat-accidentally-on-purpose), Uther had died.  Too chilled, too numb with grief, the young King Regent (no, he was _King_ now) completely surrendered himself to his manservant’s suddenly very capable, very steady hands (if one ignored their tremor, that is).

Merlin carefully undressed him, touch feather light and gentle as he unclasped Arthur’s cloak.  Untying the older boy’s jerkin, and unlacing the shift underneath, Merlin let both pool on the seat of the selfsame chair he’d carefully draped the cloak over.  Then he moved to help Arthur slip out of his breeches.

If they dropped, forgotten, to the flagstone floor, when Arthur’s head abruptly buried itself in Merlin’s chest, and if the young King’s shoulders started to tremble, even as he grabbed fistfuls of his manservant’s jacket, neither boy made any mention of it.

“He’s gone,” the whimper repeated itself.  “He’s _gone_.  Merlin--”

When the clumsy kiss landed on Arthur’s ear, Merlin had only half-made up his mind about it.

Nothing Arthur did or said acknowledged it.  He simply repeated brokenly, “ _He’s gone_ , and I don’t--”

By all indications, the King had not even noticed the kiss.  Merlin did not feel quite brave enough to try again, and instead, gently pulled Arthur over to his wardrobe.  Without a word, he helped the older boy step into his sleeping breeches and nightshirt.

Quietly resolving to be friend instead of servant tonight, he carefully guided Arthur over to his bed and eased him beneath the linens and blankets.  There he curled up on top of them all, placing himself close enough to Arthur that, should he so desire, the other boy had every ability to curl himself into a ball and tuck close to Merlin’s chest.

It did not terribly surprise the warlock when he did.

If, when the young King woke in the early, early dawn of the next day, and found an exhausted Merlin curled just as tightly around him, the very-deliberately-accidentally-on-purpose kiss he himself bestowed upon his sleeping friend’s brow went just as unacknowledged, Merlin was none the wiser.

_End A Special Kind of Devotion (Part 1) _


End file.
